


A Story About Symbolism

by Harukami



Category: Shoujo Kakumei Utena | Revolutionary Girl Utena
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-02
Updated: 2014-02-02
Packaged: 2018-01-10 21:39:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1164824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harukami/pseuds/Harukami
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two women meet in the adult world, and one has a story to tell the other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Story About Symbolism

"Let's tell you a story," she says, "about symbolism."

"A story about symbolism?" the waitress says, dubiously. She has other tables to wait, other things to do with her time than listen to a story. She's an adult woman, not some child preoccupied by fairy tales. But when she looks around, she sees the other customers have left. Figures. There's nothing to do but make sure this customer is happy enough to tip. That's the world of adults for you. "I'm not sure 'symbolism' makes for a good story."

The customer smiles, and gestures, with an open hand, to the seat across from her. "You haven't heard the story, have you?"

She looks around, but nobody else is on the floor. The place is completely deserted, like it's just her and this other person in the world, or like before now her entire life had been some kind of stage number leading into this, leaving an empty set for a new scene between the two of them. There's no other choice. She slides into the other seat.

The woman across from her smiles. "Now, then. About schools."

"I thought the story was going to be about symbolism?" She can't help but interject it.

"Yes, of course. Schools are a symbol. Schools are the garden where the seeds of humanity go to grow, and is full of the nutrients and soil that will inform what they blossom into. More precisely, schools are where children develop the skills to become adults. They are not adults yet, but neither are they children, because even beginning to learn those skills removes the innocence of childhood. They are straining into adulthood, but unable to reach that either, because they do not have the skills required, and because the environment is one of learning adulthood, not of an expected adulthood. In the end, humans only perform to what is expected of them."

The waitress lifts an eyebrow as the woman across from her pauses and sips tea, her dark fingers curling against the porcelain white cup. "This isn't much of a story so far. Just an adage. The term's 'adage', right?"

"That's the term. But you've been patient this long, so be patient a little longer," the woman says. Her cup sits against her lips as she speaks, and her breath ripples the red liquid inside. "The stages of life are usually defined like this, by their restrictions. A coffin is much the same."

"What kind of skills do you learn in a coffin? Or are you saying that you reach that confinement when you've learned all the other skills."

"It's the former," the customer says, smiling lightly, with a strangely familiar superficiality. "In a coffin, you learn how to be dead."

She can't help herself; she laughs. "That's a learnable skill?"

"It's a very difficult one to unlearn," the customer says, and laughs too.

It's strange, the waitress thinks; she hasn't heard that laugh before. She doesn't know how to react to that thought, shakes her head. "I don't think most people would say you could unlearn how to be dead."

"You can unlearn most things if you try," the customer says. She puts her teacup back down with a gentle clink. A cookie sits untouched on the plate next to the cup and that doesn't seem right either. It should be eaten by now, nibbled away. The waitress stares at it with a slowly growing feeling of discomfort. The customer says, "This may be a more important skill than learning. The world will tell you what it wants you to learn, but only you can unlearn the elements of this which harm you."

Her mouth has gone dry and her heart is beating too quickly. She flicks her gaze up into green eyes. They're unnaturally green, she thinks, or rather, too naturally. She's reminded of staring off into a forest, all the light and dark greens and everything in between mingling into a green that seems solid unless she thinks about it, a green that she doesn't notice as individual leaves any more but sees as a single unit. It's not the green of humanity. It's the type of green that should be seen from behind glass, from behind a window, separating civilization from the wild and overgrown. She says, "You still haven't told me a story about symbols."

"Once upon a time..." those soft-looking lips part in a smile. "...there was a girl who went to school, not realizing she would be learning to be an adult. She spoke as a child, reasoned as a child. Slowly, each lesson stripped away her beliefs and replaced them with the harsh reality of adult learning. The final blow was to fairy tales, her last bastion of childhood hope. She learned, as all people must do, that it is impossible to save other people. And with her childhood gone, she graduated from childhood, and put away childish things. But perhaps the lesson was too harsh, because she had not been taught anything in adulthood but pain. She could not live, because although she had learned that you cannot save others, she had never once learned how to save herself, nor seen anyone who saved themselves."

Her mouth is as cold as ice, and she swallows around that creeping chill. It's getting late. Her work will be over soon. She should excuse herself, and head home as quickly as she could. She doesn't want to see the stars. She has always hated looking at the stars.

That is one way things could go.

A light is shining from somewhere behind the other woman. This has a familiar feel. She knows this, but not from this side.

"...Have we met somewhere before?" Utena asks.

Anthy smiles and holds out her hand. "No," she says. "This is our first time truly meeting."


End file.
